Image Details

Archäologie und Altes Testament, Mohr-Siebeck, 1970

Embracing her stomach, this expectant mother serves as a very different kind of vessel. This alabaster container from 18th Dynasty Egypt (1550–1292 B.C.E.) once held ointment meant to be rubbed on the abdomen of pregnant women. Like the Revadim plaque, the woman depicted here has eyes stylistically slanted downward in fear. The fact that she, too, is standing—rather than squatting all the way down in the usual stance for childbirth in the ancient world—suggests that, although obviously pregnant, she is not yet in labor.